Though a shy, chubby kid who was often the target of bullies, I nonetheless had a fun-filled, almost idyllic childhood thanks to loving, present parents, several friends and the suburban equivalent of Little Rascals adventures. Thus my never-ending fascination with 1970's nostalgia.
All that is my way of announcing that this week's Sally Forth will focus on the Fourth of July to end all Fourth of Julys, the U.S. Bicentennial (with a nod to my childhood best friend Val Bianchini and our dads). So get ready to brush up on your Revolutionary War lessons, break out your Telstar, put on Nadia's Theme and demand that your parents take you to see Logan's Run.
And as a way to help get you in the Spirit of '76 mood, here's the first of five Schoolhouse Rock history lessons...
By the way, what is your favorite Fourth of July childhood memory?
12 comments:
I like your intro, kid. Very nice work.
My favorite Fourth of July memory is when my mother invited the neighbors over to watch my dad set off fireworks, and the neighbor brought some of her clients with her from the old folks' home (which was probably riddled with disease and corruption), and a man who may or may not have been a WWI vet stood up and sang the national anthem while my parents tried not to freak out, and then my dad set his foot on fire (while sneaker-encased). The next day I helped him walk around the yard and pick up rusty nails, because apparently fireworks in '86 involved rusty nails, and one poked through my flip-flop and nabbed me in the foot, although the wound wasn't particularly deep. But I'm pretty sure this is why my foot bleeds rust. And red, white and blue tears.
I would also like to point out that while I wasn't around for your precious Bicentennial, I WAS around for the Statue of Liberty Centennial, AND I dressed up as the Statue of Liberty and stood on the back of my friend Lizzie's dad's pick-up truck with other similarly dressed girls and we rode around the neighborhood blaring sweet sweet Amurrrican tunes from a boom box.
I don`t have a favourite Fourth of July memory...I`m Canadian.
I spent the Bicentennial flying across most of the US. I was 17, my folks had saved for several years for a last big family vacation before I left for college, and so we went to Hawaii. Our flight home was delayed which worked out well because at midnight July 3d-4th we flew over the Golden Gate Bridge as everybody sang "Happy Birthday" to America. We switched planes and then flew the rest for the way back to Ohio. 1976 was a fun year!
Best July 4 memory as an adult, proposing to my wife during the fireworks finale in Vienna, Virginia on July 4, 1989. Her response was "what?" as she couldn't hear me at first. Then she saw the ring. (grin)
In small-town Kansas, someone kicked a smokebomb into a big bag of fireworks.
Things were slow. It was *Kansas.*
Do we fill up your internets with a whole lot of crap about Australia on January 26th? No, we're too busy eating sausages and drinking beer. Why do you Americans feel the need to spread your national holidays to every corner of the Earth?
My favorite memory was going to see a band play on the Fourth. I must've been four or five. I remember being so excited when they played The Stars and Stripes Forever!
That concert led to a life-long love of music. I was a professional musician for over 20 years, thanks to that concert (and the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts...)
wallsy, stop being such a wanker.
Well, the fireworks were fun, back when you could buy them. Truth be told, I have more Labor Day memories. Maybe because I went a big party at a lake every Labor Day and I spent the 4th at my father's in California. We didn't do much.
I remember my mom watching Operation Sail, which was all those boats sailing down the Hudson River, which I suppose was extremely patriotic or something. As all those boats passed Manhattan on the TV, my mother wondered aloud why all that displaced water didn't overflow the river's banks and flood Manhattan Island.
Claude, that was cool. I remember watching that on TV as well ()while my folks slept off the jet lag).
As part of the Bicentennial madness people were supposed to ring bells, all at the same time, in a great flood of national noisiness. My family was going to a picnic at my elementary school, so we took the string of jingly bells that usually hung on the inside of the front door. When the time came, my little sister and I stood up, each took an end of the string, and jingled our little hearts out. Alone. Receiving quizzical looks from all of the other picnickers. What, they didn't get the memo?
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